16 February 2014

Old Young Guns

At the interval in the cricket yesterday a selection of the legendary-but-thwarted 1992 New Zealand World Cup team put in an appearance, to hit balls into the Basin Reserve crowd to celebrate tickets going on sale for the Australia-New Zealand World Cup next year.

The 1992 Martin Crowe-led side excelled in the pool matches, blitzing opponents with seven straight wins before coming unstuck against eventual champions Pakistan. New Zealand made a little history by throwing innovative tactics into the mix - opening the batting with Mark Greatbatch in a pinch-hitter role, opening the bowling with offspinner Dipak Patel, and restricting the run-rate with medium-pacers like Gavin Larsen and Chris Harris - but the real achievement was winning self-belief for a team often short of it. They still look in fairly good shape 22 years later!

Martin Crowe (top left), Chris Harris (throwing)

Crowe tries to hit one into the Vance Stand

CZ Harris (23 tests, 250 ODIs)

MJ Greatbatch (41 tests, 84 ODIs)
DN Patel (37 tests, 75 ODIs)

No comments: